In the production of a semiconductor module, its patterns are fabricated in a variety of planes. A completed semiconductor module encompasses a plurality of planes in which the individual patterns are located. The orientation of the individual planes with respect to one another is of considerable importance. If a plane were shifted too much with respect to a previous or subsequent plane, this could result in an interruption of the connection between elements in one plane and the next. The orientation, shifting, and alignment of two successive planes is referred to as “overlay shift.” In semiconductor production, wafers are sequentially processed during the production process in a plurality of process steps. As integration density increases, requirements in terms of the quality of the patterns configured on the wafers become more stringent. To allow the quality of the configured patterns to be checked and any defects to be discovered, commensurate demands are placed on the quality, accuracy, and reproducibility of the components and process steps with which the wafers are handled. This means that in the production of a wafer, with the many process steps and many layers of photoresist or the like that must be applied, reliable and prompt detection of defects is particularly important. Equally significant for the quality of a semiconductor component is the overlay of the individual planes in the semiconductor component. It is thus particularly important that the shift of the individual planes remain within a tolerance range.